MSI K7T Turbo w RAID 133 Mhz/Duron and Promise problems

[jfkaiser]

1. The 2.4 bios does NOT initialize the Promise Raid controller bios if you
have some brands of TNT2 (Leadtek Winfast2 Ultra) or the Geforce 256
(Hercules 256 DDR-DVI )cards..maybe others
You don't even see the Promise screen at all.
Solution: flash to the latest beta (b16 I think) and you're good to
go...MSI Techs were not aware of this, but I verified it with different AGP
cards.

2. I was having trouble getting my unlocked Duron 600 which I usually run
at 101 fsb x 10 = 1010 Mhz. to come up in 133 fsb. It seems that if you
don't get a successful boot after changing some multiplier/voltage/bus
setting in the K7T Turbo Bios (either v2.4 or Beta b16) the system will
reset to the DEFAULT multiplier on the Duron chip. For me it kept resetting
to 6 x 133 = 800 Mhz.

MSI should address this in a bios update so that you are'nt forced back to
the chips Default multiplier (at least fix the Overclocking bios's to not
act that way).

Solution: I had to set the 100/133 jumper on Motherboard to 100 Mhz. Then
go in and set my multiplier to what I wanted it to be when it would
eventually be set to 133 fsb.
What I mean is that I had to set it for 7.5 x 100 (which I knew it could
handle) to get a clean boot at 100 fsb.....but anticipating eventually doing
7.5 x 133. Set my voltage at this time also to what I knew chip needed at 1
Ghz speed.

Then I would do F10 and save and exit bios screen but right away KILL the
power strip........then bleed any remaining power from the PC by depressing
the power switch on PC even though power strip was off. THIS IS CRITICAL.

Next I turn on the PC and check for (750 Mhz) 7.5 x 100......if I don't
immediately see confirmation of my desired 7.5 multiplier (which I'll need
for proper speed at 133 fsb) I'll kill and bleed the PC again till I boot
and see that magic number.

I then shut off and bleed the PC again, but now I change my jumper to 133
fsb and reboot........again, if I don't see the proper speed at post (997
Mhz 133 x 7.5) I'll kill and bleed the PC again and usually that is all it
takes.

Once you have forced your multiplier to the desired setting for your chip,
you should not have to go thru this process again (or at least until your
next flash).

BTW.....I am writing this post with my K7T Turbo proudly driving my little
Duron at 1020 Mhz (136 FSB x 7.5).
I hope above info helps some people out.....it took alot of reboots to see
any kinda pattern.

Thx,
Jon

 

[jfkaiser]

I hate having to recant my first posting....but

After running my Duron 600 successfully at 7.5 x 136 last night and benching it and rebooting, etc. I awoke this morning to a boot with no video sync.

I tried every action mentioned in my first post including the "bleeding of power" and was unable to get the chip back to the 7.5 multiplier again....it would continue to come up at its factory default of 6x....even though it's unlocked.

I sure hope MSI addresses this wierd "safe mode" of bringing a boot back to original multiplier if failed the first boot attempt (7.5x)

The only other thing I could do would be to "Hard Mod" my chip to 7.5 and I really don't want to do that.

Come on MSI.....help us out here!

Thx,
Jon

 

[jfkaiser]

Hi....Im Back !!

Ok here is the latest attempt at a solution.
I had been running back at the 100 FSB speed after my failures to get back to 133fsb mentioned above. PC had been running for about 3-4 hours....not sure if PC being warmed up had anything to do with what follows....

I decided to try and get back to a bootable 7.5 multiplier (whether it be at 100 or 133) I just wanted to see if I could ever get machine to hold at 7.5 again.

I kept bus at 100 fsb and set Duron600 for 9x. I hit F10 to save and rebooted OK..no power off and bleed this time. I did NOT hit F10 and power off immediately as describe in my earlier post. I just did F10 and saw if PC got video sync or not. That is same for what is described below too.

Next I went for 8.5 and saved. Got no video sync after save reboot, so powered off and bled PC by depressing power button with Power strip off. This time machine DID come back at 8.5 x 100.

Next I went down to 8x then finally the desired 7.5x multiplier following exact process mentioned above about powering off and bleeding.......woo hoo I got machine to talk to 7.5 again.

Final step was to change jumper to 133fsb and see if machine came up.....YES success, and once again I am writing this from a PC actually running 7.5 x 136 fsb = 1020MHhz.

I only pray that tomorrow when I turn the PC on again it will come up at 1020 and not fail as it did earlier today.

I don't know if the changing back to 100 fsb and then starting to go down from 9x to 7.5 is really necessary.......If I have to do this again I will try leaving the fsb at 133 and coming down from 9x to 7.5 (if my Duron can handle 9 x133 just to get the wierd process going on way down to 7.5

I would hope that something here can be logically explained and fixed in future bios release. I read something about Hi and Low states of the Durons and maybe my strange procedure somehow switches those states and lets me re-attain the 7.5 multiplier....I'm not sure.

Thx,
Jon

 

[Slappy5]

Good posts, I for one appreciate you passing that along. Although my mobo (k7t pro2a) does not support 133fsb, I am trying desparately to get my Duron 750 to at least 950 with absolutely NO luck. Of course, I can change my multiplier to anything I like below 7.5, but anything above results in either a lock, or in the case of 9.5, steps me down to 550mhz. <sigh> Anyhow, I have seen it post before @ 850mhz when I mult @ 8.5, but went rummaging into the bios and lost it when I rebooted. I'll be sure and give that PS bleed trick a whirl, I'll let you know if it works or not early tomorrow. Cheers!

John

 

[jfkaiser]

Cool....
It took me three boots today to get machine up and 1020 Mhz after bleeding the PC and powering off the power strip, but I finally got it going.

It is unfortunate that I expected 133 to be a breeze on one of the KT133a boards and it has definitely turned out to be a hassle.

Oh well,
Early adopters pay with their time.
Thx,
Jon

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE
Well after running at 136 fsb as described above for at least two weeks, I went thru a period of time where my machine had not been powered on for about two days.......guess what.....couldn't get the damn video sync back.

I tried re-bleeding the power supply etc. as I had described above, but never got it back at 136 fsb again.

I suppose I could have used the proven technique (mentioned above) of starting at 10x / 100 fsb and gradually moving multiplier down till achieve 7.5 x then change bus speed jumper.

I finally decided that the amount of power-offs and &quot;bleeding&quot; off of the power supply just isn't worth the effort to run at 136 fsb. I have run Sandra benchmarks at both speeds and not seen enough difference.

I am back to booting everytime, but using my old reliable speed of 10 x 102 fsb = 1020 Mhz.

Sure glad I bought a 133 fsb board, only to have to run it at 100 !
Thx,
Jon

 

[tracerbullet]

Well, I'm glad I did a search. I was about to post a long string of how I was setting up my new Turbo R, with my Herc DDR DVI.

Guess I'll go do this BIOS thing.

Thanks!

Only spent 1 hour trying to figure it out. If I hadn't searched here it would have been days.

Hey - thanks again.

It's always something, isn't it? Finally got this in after RMA'ing an Abit KT7A RAID, maybe it's not just me after all.